Just Try: The Fall Off

A Review Of J. Cole's Highly Anticipated Album

If falling off is inevitable, what must we do to ensure our fall is graceful? J. Cole offers us an answer.

Since the album released on Friday, I’ve taken my time listening to this project. At first glance and during my first listen, I didn’t quite enjoy a lot of the album. I thought Disc 29 felt chaotic, loud, experimental, far from the Cole I’ve grown to love. And to a similar tune, I thought Disc 39 felt a little too familiar, a little too much like the music we’ve gotten from him over the course of the last few years. But, the more I sat with this album the more I began to remove my expectations of what I thought it was supposed to be and instead let Cole tell me his story. And that’s when I began to finally appreciate it for what it is. J. Cole intended for this album to not be something you can or should consume in one sitting. In an age of music created solely to appease algorithms and Gen Z’ers with an attention span of a goldfish, this exists as an anthesis to the phenomenon.

Disc 29 is supposed to represent Cole in his prime and during his youth. How many of our youthful days weren’t filled with chaos, mess, and a absence of direction. Disc 39 offers the remedy. It’s a lot more succinct and tight knit. It offers a reflection on the decade following the chaos of your youth when it’s time to apply the lessons you’ve learned along the way. I will say, this album top to bottom is far from my favorite Cole album, but I do genuinely think some of the songs on the album (SAFETY, Poor Thang, I Love Her Again) are some of my favorite Cole songs ever.

My main critiques of the album are that it is a tad too long, the production was lax at times, and he should’ve had a few more features especially for the more melodic hooks and choruses. I would’ve shortened the track list to about 15 songs, brought in someone like a Shaboozey to sing the hook for “The Let Out”, and outsourced the production to more producers like The Alchemist. A lot of the criticism I’ve seen from pundits on the internet centers around the album also feeling too familiar and largely forgettable. I don’t think you can truly asses the success of an album over the course of 4 days while listening to it through your AirPods. Only time can be both the judge and jury when it comes to assessing the success of art.

So, what does J. Cole teach us about falling off? What can we learn from the 24 song, 1 hour and 41 minute project that Cole has been promoting for the better part of the last decade? I’ll tell you what I learned at least.

If we are to fall off, it’s best to ensure that we cushion the foundation of our lives as best as we can. That our foundation is cushioned with things like our families, our purpose, our impact, and most importantly those morals and standards to which we hold ourselves the most accountable. If your foundation is plastered with desire, material things, and the urge to stay relevant; even when it is your time to pass the baton, sit back and reflect on what it is you’ve done and what there is left for you to do, you won’t be able to do so. That urge will never leave you. You’ll be stuck in a constant loop of creating and consuming only to gain recognition and gratification from everyone except the people and the things that matter to you the most. Because as Cole alludes to in “Quik Stop”

“ 'cause this continuous race
To be the best will leave you steppin' at a strenuous pace
'Til you forget who you is, and you forget who you ain't
Before you know it, you're trapped inside that picture you paint
This life is more than just rap, more than the b**** you scrape
More than the riches you stack, see, it's the difference you make
Yeah, it's the difference you make”

This album showed me exactly that. Cole did not spend the better part of the last decade putting this album together to appease the masses, he didn’t do it for any more social, critical, and commercial acclaim. He did it for him. To try to make a difference in the lives of those who his music touches. The songs you hear are those that help him feel complete in his journey. That help him to feel happy and whole. And if that’s enough for him, why shouldn’t that be enough for us?

The song that brought it home for me, which is probably why it’s my favorite song on the album, is “I Think I Love Her Again”. This song I think represents in every aspect what it is that made Cole a star in the first place. The story telling, the lyrics, the introspective feel that makes you ponder on your relationship with the subject matter. The genius use of a metaphor inserting a woman in the place of hip-hop and black culture. What I appreciated the most about the song was the last few bars which I think encapsulates his relationship with Hip-hop and why he feels ready to fall off:

“But the more I thought about her quotes, she was right
There was a time when she was on my phone day and night
Singin' songs to me that I heard a time or two
Some were kind of old and some were kind of new
But you'll see how it is gettin' older, raisin' kids
All that spendin' time and listenin' to her is hard to do
But, yo, I need to stop judgin' and accept her
The problem from the start is I was just tryna to possess her
And have her for my own, didn't wanna let her roam
Mama said, "You should've known she was like that when you met her"

Because you see rap, art, music, life, and culture, doesn’t belong to us. We’re supposed to add our spin to it, add our flare, and then release it back into the world and let it roam. We have to accept it for what it is and stop trying to change things in our image because that’ll only lead to more strife. And that’s exactly what Cole did. He came in the game, added his spin on things, took control of it even at one point, and learned that’s not what the end goal was supposed to be. It’s supposed to let go. Fall off. Depart. Now he’s finally ready to and maybe one day if we all learn from J. Cole, our Fall Off could be just as graceful.